LakesideWiseman
Member
Hello everyone! This is my first ever grow of my very own. I have helped a little here and there with various growers in the past, and done my fair share of trimming, but I've finally got my own tent and setup together. So without further ado, here's some more info and pictures to follow.
The Beginning
On Jan 23 I was gifted, what I was told, a True OG teen. It was about 18 inches tall and in a 6.5 liter pot. It had spider mites and had pH problems all around. After a few days in isolation with a No Pest Strip (Yes I know the dangers. This was a mother plant, not a flowering plant. It worked. I do not plan on using them in the future, nor do I plan on relying upon them. It was a last ditch effort to save this teen so I could begin my grow.), and being transplanted it into a 5 Gal pot with some Roots Organics Soil, she started to do much better. It took me a couple tries to get my cloning technique down. I tried the bubble cloner method with no roots at 12 days. I found rockwool, with a dome with lots of air flow, and watering everyday to be the most effective method, with roots at about 7 days.
I finally got so sick of soil, that I started making serious plans for hydro, and had my eye on Coco for a while now. I run a variation of H3AD's Lucas recipe 6/9 micro/bloom in Veg and Flower, more on this later.
When I was finally able to get a good round of clones going, with roots flowing out of the cubes, I transplanted them into 16 oz beer cups with 50/50 Coco/Hydroton. The very next day, March 20, I put them into the flower tent under a 4 bulb 4 foot T5. At this time I was simply hand watering them. I am expecting a 9-10 week (65-75 days) flower.
- Current Veg Tent -
2' x 4' with 200 watts of CFL.
- Current Bloom Tent -
2.5' x 5' with 216 watts of T5, 4 foot 4 bulb Hydrofarm.
March 20th - Day 1 of 12/12 directly from Clone
Flower: Day 1
Early on I had some issues with Spider Mites, and ended up throwing out the original mother and using a clone which I put into a 2 gal Hempy also filled with 50/50 Coco/Hydroton. I have found that persistent application of habanero pepper spray to be EXTREMELY effective on those buggers.
- Current BLOOM Nutrient Regimen
- 5g MaxiBloom
- 2g JCOS (Jack's Classic Orchid Special)
- 6 mL CalMag+
- ¼ mL SuperThrive
- 3.5 mL pH UP
Flower: Day 5
Some early flowers!
Flower: Day 11
Scrog Net Installed!
- Current BLOOM Nutrient Regimen – (Added CalMag+ and MaxiBloom)
- 6g MaxiBloom
- 2g JCOS
- 10 mL CalMag+
- ¼ mL SuperThrive
- 3.5 mL pH UP
Flower: Day 15-18
Somewhere around here I began watering twice daily when possible. However, lights went on at 9 PM and off at 9 AM, so I would try to get in a watering at lights on, as well as before I went to bed, or at least before lights out in the morning. They were starting to get pretty big at this point, and I was itching to get my 600 watt ballast setup, but I knew I wouldn't be able to keep up hand watering them in these pots if I did, so I set out to design a drip system.
Flower: Day 20-30
Around this point, I began to notice a root aphid problem developing. They came out of the Roots Organics Soil, I am sure of it. After much research I found very little promise in treatments for flower. I tried drenching with CaliCleaner(Habanero Spray) to no avail. I began adding EWC Tea weekly to my feeding schedule in hopes of beneficial bacteria/fungi helping the situation. It began to spiral out of control with flyers everywhere at some point, and I finally just went with Pyrethrum directly in the reservoir (Which I'll describe here shortly). This definitely cleared them out, but I seriously doubt this method would work for anyone using larger size pots, especially without drippers, or running DTW. These are seriously resilient fuckers, and I still have seen a stray one or two crawling around my cups; the same day I finally changed the res out with no pyrethrum too! The problem is still continuing in my veg, but organic treatments seem to be helping, and I have plans to take clones and throw all the mothers out and hit the new flower with a full on dunk in pyrethrum before transplant as well as in the reservoir again if needed.
- Current BLOOM Nutrient Regimen – (Subtracted CalMag+ and JCOS, Added MaxiBloom)
- 7g MaxiBloom
- 3 mL CalMag+
- ¼ mL SuperThrive
- 3.5-4.0 mL pH UP
Flower: Day 31
Here is where the magic really begins! Today I installed the gravity feed drip system and bought a reflector/bulb for the 600 watt HPS ballast I've had laying around that I bought for $25 from a homie. (More drip system info later in this post!) I also got tired of shaking jugs to mix up the MaxiBloom, so I went ahead and bought some GH Bloom/Micro. Mixing up a 6 gallon res just didn't seem practical with a 1 part. I also wanted more control near the end of flower. This original nute regimen was too strong for my girls I found quickly, and started backing off the concentration. I had read that when running drippers in Coco that a low PPM and watering more often is the way to go, however I was still ignorant and running basically Lucas, but still with little problems other than a little burn.
- New BLOOM Nute Regimen
- 8ml Micro per Gal
- 16ml Bloom per Gal
- 2 ½ ml per Gal
- ½ ml Floralicious Plus per Gal
- 3ml pH UP
Flower: Day 32-50
Somewhere around this time was when the pyrethrum went into the res. It was at a fairly high concentration, and stayed in there for about a week. I tried using this Foliar Pack which has fungi/bacteria specifically to control pest population. I had little success, but I was at a ridiculous level of infestation, and more experimentation is needed.
You can find it http://ogbiowar.com/ and http://www.ebay.com/itm/for-the-farm-only-/230761890387?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&var=&hash=item35ba7b0253. The Ebay choice is cheaper.
At some point here I started dripping 4-6 times daily for 1-2 mins, depending on the timer settings, which I still don't have 100% dialed in, especially with this DTW, there is a lot of waste, but my nutrients are fairly cheap. With the gravity feed, and the open ended drip, I've had trouble getting distribution even while minimizing runoff. More experimentation is needed here.
Somewhere near 45-50 days I started playing with Bloom boosters and reducing m Nitrogen content, and started using the CannaStats Nutrient Spreadsheet pretty heavily. I think I cut the N out too early and that I was also having some pH swing problems and precipitation in the res. So some of the leaves were dying prematurely. I also began adding Silica in place of pH UP. I have since corrected the problem, but some of the plants are showing more burn/deficiencies than others. Also two of the plants got pretty dried out one night before I got the drip dialed in well enough, and they lost some leaves from that as well. It's my first grow and it's all a learning experience. I still am pretty proud of what I'm pulling out of these 16 oz cups!
Flower: Day 62-65 (8 Weeks)
So now here we are. These last few pictures are from the last couple days. I'm planning to harvest sometime in the next week to two weeks. We will see how things mature.
Drip Details
Basically I simply took a 17 Gal Ruffneck Tote cut a hole and used some sort of drain fitting I found at home depot. I then attached a 3/4 inch drip timer and that ran into 1/2 inch drip tubing. I then simply used the stab in tees, along the run with a cap on the end. The stab in tees all have 1/4 drip tubing running open ended to the plants. There is a valve before the timer, as well as a garden hose quick release for easy reservoir changes. Finally there is also another valve after the timer for general flow control.
To be continued...
The Beginning
On Jan 23 I was gifted, what I was told, a True OG teen. It was about 18 inches tall and in a 6.5 liter pot. It had spider mites and had pH problems all around. After a few days in isolation with a No Pest Strip (Yes I know the dangers. This was a mother plant, not a flowering plant. It worked. I do not plan on using them in the future, nor do I plan on relying upon them. It was a last ditch effort to save this teen so I could begin my grow.), and being transplanted it into a 5 Gal pot with some Roots Organics Soil, she started to do much better. It took me a couple tries to get my cloning technique down. I tried the bubble cloner method with no roots at 12 days. I found rockwool, with a dome with lots of air flow, and watering everyday to be the most effective method, with roots at about 7 days.
I finally got so sick of soil, that I started making serious plans for hydro, and had my eye on Coco for a while now. I run a variation of H3AD's Lucas recipe 6/9 micro/bloom in Veg and Flower, more on this later.
When I was finally able to get a good round of clones going, with roots flowing out of the cubes, I transplanted them into 16 oz beer cups with 50/50 Coco/Hydroton. The very next day, March 20, I put them into the flower tent under a 4 bulb 4 foot T5. At this time I was simply hand watering them. I am expecting a 9-10 week (65-75 days) flower.
- Current Veg Tent -
2' x 4' with 200 watts of CFL.
- Current Bloom Tent -
2.5' x 5' with 216 watts of T5, 4 foot 4 bulb Hydrofarm.
March 20th - Day 1 of 12/12 directly from Clone
Flower: Day 1
Early on I had some issues with Spider Mites, and ended up throwing out the original mother and using a clone which I put into a 2 gal Hempy also filled with 50/50 Coco/Hydroton. I have found that persistent application of habanero pepper spray to be EXTREMELY effective on those buggers.
- Current BLOOM Nutrient Regimen
- 5g MaxiBloom
- 2g JCOS (Jack's Classic Orchid Special)
- 6 mL CalMag+
- ¼ mL SuperThrive
- 3.5 mL pH UP
Flower: Day 5
Some early flowers!
Flower: Day 11
Scrog Net Installed!
- Current BLOOM Nutrient Regimen – (Added CalMag+ and MaxiBloom)
- 6g MaxiBloom
- 2g JCOS
- 10 mL CalMag+
- ¼ mL SuperThrive
- 3.5 mL pH UP
Flower: Day 15-18
Somewhere around here I began watering twice daily when possible. However, lights went on at 9 PM and off at 9 AM, so I would try to get in a watering at lights on, as well as before I went to bed, or at least before lights out in the morning. They were starting to get pretty big at this point, and I was itching to get my 600 watt ballast setup, but I knew I wouldn't be able to keep up hand watering them in these pots if I did, so I set out to design a drip system.
Flower: Day 20-30
Around this point, I began to notice a root aphid problem developing. They came out of the Roots Organics Soil, I am sure of it. After much research I found very little promise in treatments for flower. I tried drenching with CaliCleaner(Habanero Spray) to no avail. I began adding EWC Tea weekly to my feeding schedule in hopes of beneficial bacteria/fungi helping the situation. It began to spiral out of control with flyers everywhere at some point, and I finally just went with Pyrethrum directly in the reservoir (Which I'll describe here shortly). This definitely cleared them out, but I seriously doubt this method would work for anyone using larger size pots, especially without drippers, or running DTW. These are seriously resilient fuckers, and I still have seen a stray one or two crawling around my cups; the same day I finally changed the res out with no pyrethrum too! The problem is still continuing in my veg, but organic treatments seem to be helping, and I have plans to take clones and throw all the mothers out and hit the new flower with a full on dunk in pyrethrum before transplant as well as in the reservoir again if needed.
- Current BLOOM Nutrient Regimen – (Subtracted CalMag+ and JCOS, Added MaxiBloom)
- 7g MaxiBloom
- 3 mL CalMag+
- ¼ mL SuperThrive
- 3.5-4.0 mL pH UP
Flower: Day 31
Here is where the magic really begins! Today I installed the gravity feed drip system and bought a reflector/bulb for the 600 watt HPS ballast I've had laying around that I bought for $25 from a homie. (More drip system info later in this post!) I also got tired of shaking jugs to mix up the MaxiBloom, so I went ahead and bought some GH Bloom/Micro. Mixing up a 6 gallon res just didn't seem practical with a 1 part. I also wanted more control near the end of flower. This original nute regimen was too strong for my girls I found quickly, and started backing off the concentration. I had read that when running drippers in Coco that a low PPM and watering more often is the way to go, however I was still ignorant and running basically Lucas, but still with little problems other than a little burn.
- New BLOOM Nute Regimen
- 8ml Micro per Gal
- 16ml Bloom per Gal
- 2 ½ ml per Gal
- ½ ml Floralicious Plus per Gal
- 3ml pH UP
Flower: Day 32-50
Somewhere around this time was when the pyrethrum went into the res. It was at a fairly high concentration, and stayed in there for about a week. I tried using this Foliar Pack which has fungi/bacteria specifically to control pest population. I had little success, but I was at a ridiculous level of infestation, and more experimentation is needed.
You can find it http://ogbiowar.com/ and http://www.ebay.com/itm/for-the-farm-only-/230761890387?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&var=&hash=item35ba7b0253. The Ebay choice is cheaper.
At some point here I started dripping 4-6 times daily for 1-2 mins, depending on the timer settings, which I still don't have 100% dialed in, especially with this DTW, there is a lot of waste, but my nutrients are fairly cheap. With the gravity feed, and the open ended drip, I've had trouble getting distribution even while minimizing runoff. More experimentation is needed here.
Somewhere near 45-50 days I started playing with Bloom boosters and reducing m Nitrogen content, and started using the CannaStats Nutrient Spreadsheet pretty heavily. I think I cut the N out too early and that I was also having some pH swing problems and precipitation in the res. So some of the leaves were dying prematurely. I also began adding Silica in place of pH UP. I have since corrected the problem, but some of the plants are showing more burn/deficiencies than others. Also two of the plants got pretty dried out one night before I got the drip dialed in well enough, and they lost some leaves from that as well. It's my first grow and it's all a learning experience. I still am pretty proud of what I'm pulling out of these 16 oz cups!
Flower: Day 62-65 (8 Weeks)
So now here we are. These last few pictures are from the last couple days. I'm planning to harvest sometime in the next week to two weeks. We will see how things mature.
Drip Details
Basically I simply took a 17 Gal Ruffneck Tote cut a hole and used some sort of drain fitting I found at home depot. I then attached a 3/4 inch drip timer and that ran into 1/2 inch drip tubing. I then simply used the stab in tees, along the run with a cap on the end. The stab in tees all have 1/4 drip tubing running open ended to the plants. There is a valve before the timer, as well as a garden hose quick release for easy reservoir changes. Finally there is also another valve after the timer for general flow control.
To be continued...
